


The Pink-Haired Angel

by Enlightened_Introvert



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Animal Death, Emotional, Mild Blood, Non-detailed violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-25 02:27:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12520884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enlightened_Introvert/pseuds/Enlightened_Introvert
Summary: Two men come across an opportunity they can’t pass up, and others must pay the ultimate cost.Alternatively: Rose discovers a new ability.





	The Pink-Haired Angel

Many years ago, two men prowled the outskirts of the vast desert, muskets at the ready as they lead a horse-drawn carriage full of wealth. The bourgeois payed good money for lion pelts.

Peddling lion pelts became a lucrative market after outrageous claims were made of a “pink-haired angel and her pride of seven lions” made by one Buddy Budwick, who shambled exhaustedly from the desert bearing his spectacular tale and a spark of inspiration. Despite the absurdity of his claim, the people latched onto the idea that these were real entities, especially when other claimed sights filtered into the region. This finally ended with claims of having caught one of the godly—or hellish, according to some—lions. Skeptical and ambitious, hunters were eager to get a piece of the profit. It had been several years since the original claim, but the legend still stood firmly in the minds of the general public.

The men walked on in the hot sun, collecting lions as they went, on the off-chance that a sign would come and make the magical lions known. Suddenly, one man threw out his arm to stop the other, pointing with his musket at a distant point amid a stand of acacia trees. What they beheld rendered these men, more skeptical than most, utterly speechless.

There was a healthy pride, small but well-fed and ranging in age from young cub to young adult, and the men thought guiltily of the old male they had shot earlier that day. It certainly wasn’t what was described years ago—three adult males and four adult females—but the figure in their midst said otherwise. The angel, for that is who she must be, sat prostrate in the middle. There was a lion whose head rested in her lap, one of her arms wrapped limply around his massive neck with her face buried in his mane.

“The angel…” the first man breathed, without fear of the pride taking notice.

“How can we be sure she isn’t a mirage?” The other, a hardened old man, replied. “Or a wayward harlot?”

“Look there!” The first whispered excitedly, pointing. “The ground is thriving where she lay! A patch of spring green in this desert! Surly this is nothing short of a divine miracle!”

“Divine miracle, indeed,” the older man replied, his finger twitching against the trigger of his gun. Legend be damned, their fur was gorgeous whether they belonged to an angel or a harlot or a mirage.

Hiding their carriage in the tall grass, as much from bandits as from their hostile prey, the men formulated a plan. If the woman was indeed a guardian angel or a vengeful spirit, they would have to be careful with how they dispatch the beasts. They would have to lure the pride away from their mistress and further into the desert, where there was little chance for her to hear the gunshots. Even if she was a well-kept wild woman, they both felt it would be a disgrace to kill her companions where she could witness it. They were still decent enough men.

They had no idea what was to transpire.

The old man unhitched one of the horses while the younger one slapped its rump, sending it racing towards the sandy expanse. At once, one of the unburdened females, one without a cub, bolted through the grass towards the distressed animal, quick and stealthy. The did as best as they could to keep up, following her further and further until there was nowhere else to hide.

“Do the honors, my boy,” the old man cackled in success. “We’ll take turns.”

 

 

The young man trudged back the way they came to retrieve the wagon, a pit forming in his stomach. Whether it was fear of predators tracking the smell of blood on his clothes or fear of divine intervention, he wasn’t sure, but he was sure that his heart was caught in his throat. He held his musket aloft, waiting for the sleeping angel to smite him where he stood.

The savanna was quiet, save for the  _shush_  of grass swaying in the wind and sand sliding across the ground. The wagon was thirty yards away, right as they had left it; the acacia trees were a hundred yards away, where the angel still slept. Her maned companion was gone.

A shiver ran down the young man’s spine, feeling cold amber eyes watching him the brush, but he stood transfixed by the angel. She was huddled on the ground, as if the lion had taken care not to wake her, her head rested against the soft grass. Against his better judgement, he began to wander closer for a better look; after all, it was likely that he would never see her again, especially after…no, he wouldn’t think of it.

Closer inspection revealed that she had been crying, twin streaks cutting down her cheeks mingled with grime from the ground. As he watched, another tear escaped and rolled slowly down her face before veering from the accepted course. Finally, it dripped off the tip of her nose and onto the soil. The man stifled a shocked gasp as, from that point, a tiny pink bud sprouted before her face, unfurling into a little rose, and the grass grew longer all around it.

If there were any hint of doubt regarding her divinity, it had long since escaped his mind.

A low growl yanked him from his musings and the angel twitched in her troubled slumber, another tear falling, another rose springing to life. He lifted his musket up swiveling this way and that as he searched for the rogue male, come to defend his mistress. The young man could see nothing.

“Look out!” He heard his partner cry in the distance, and he barely registered what was happening until the male was flying from the grass with gigantic paws raised. The man did what he had to do: he fired, sprinting backwards before the body could land on top of him, and the lion fell to the ground, heart-shaped nose in the dirt and a pool of blood spreading around him.

He should have been thrilled. What a story to tell the people back in Manchester: he had survived a lion attack, shooting him from the air! With the haul they brought in this day, both he and his partner would be rich men, but his heart had dropped from his throat into the pit.

“What…what is going on?” His heart stopped altogether. He was terrified to turn towards the soft, disoriented voice, but turn he must.

She strode between the men, looking first at the elder and then the younger, before finally looking down at the victim. To the young man’s surprise, no tears replaced those that had fallen moments ago. Instead, there was a complicated expression in her eyes that let both men know that they should fear for their lives at this very moment. The lion was nothing compared to what this angel could do.

“What have you done?!” The woman cried tremulously, grasping at the jewel embedded in her skin subconsciously.

“I’m s-sorry, m-miss,” the old man began shakily. “Is th-this your b-beast?”

“Where are the others?” She demanded.

He swallowed, hard. “O-others?”

It was not the wrath of God they should have feared, but the fury of this woman. Before his partner could react, great vines had erupted from the ground beneath him, tangling tightly around his body and lifting him into the air, eye-level with her. The young man felt something slide around his body, and he yelped in surprise as a similar vine held him prisoner.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about, you awful human! You reek of blood!” The vines shook him violently as she shouted the words in his face, mere inches from her own. “Say it!”

“But you already know—”

“I. Want. To. Hear. You. Say. It.” Her voice was low, beautiful and deadly, with venom dripping from every word.

“Please, I have a wife and three children,” the old man blubbered. “Please don’t kill me!”

She raised a hand menacingly, slowly drawing her drawing her fingers inward as the vines constricted around his helpless partner, who sobbed and gasped in fear. He had never seen the old man like this before, and the sight made clear the situation they were in. The angel had power beyond their comprehension, even more than they had initially thought possible, and her fury was palpable.

“We killed them!” The young man screamed. “We killed them!”

Her hand wavered, fingers trembling, and the vice-like grip of the vines lessened until the two men fell unceremoniously to the ground, and her hands to her sides. As the vines retreated into the dirt, they slipped around their weapons and began to drag them away. They both cringed at the sound of crunching metal as the angel clenched her fists, and the mangled muskets were buried beneath the sand.

The men huddled on the ground in terror, waiting for the final blow to come, for lightning to rain down from the heavens and smite them where the lay, but it didn’t come. Instead, the woman moved slowly towards the lion, crumpling at his side and laying over his body. Blood stained her dress and her hands, but she didn’t notice as she sobbed into his mane as if her heart had been shattered into pieces.

“We were desperate!” The young man finally cried, trying to lessen the guilt that was rising in his chest. “We wouldn’t have killed them if silver wasn’t so hard to come by!”

“We need a profit, or else we’d be destitute!” The old man interjected, feeding off of the lie. “My wife, my children…”

She sobbed loudly, choking in back as she interrupted, “you ask for too high a price.”

“You don’t understand—”

“I understand completely!” She snapped. “You don’t understand the value of life, and so you waste it, and you take it away and trade it like its currency.” She fell apart again, with an anguished whisper, “awful humans, please leave.”

“But, miss!”

“Take their bodies and go,” she continued defeatedly. “They’re of more use to you, now that they’re dead. Just leave this one, please. I raised him as a cub because his mother was slaughtered by humans like you. I can’t leave him to whatever sick fate you have in store, even if he’s…just go.”

But the men could no, in good conscience, leave this woman like this, after taking what she held dear from her. Instead, they watched as she planted a kiss on the beast’s forehead, then again on the bridge of his nose, whispering things that neither of them could hear, nor were they worthy behold. After a third kiss, she sat up with a start, staring wide-eyed at the corpse. Momentarily, the men would know why.

It started dimly, a pink glow that began at his face and spread through his whole body, growing in intensity. It flowed like water over him until he was consumed in the light, before quickly fading away, leaving behind the impression of pink. No…

The lion stirred.

This was no woman, no angel, nor harlot, nor mirage. She had resurrected this beast from the dead and subsequently claimed him as her familiar, they were sure of it. What was the meaning of this? It appeared that the woman hadn’t a clue, either.

“Stars,” she breathed, watching the lion roll his head against the ground and let out a tired grunt. “Oh, stars above.” She quickly moved to turn him to the side, examining the point on his chest where the bullet had penetrated, where only a scare remained now. “You’ve stopped bleeding,” she gasped.

The lion slowly came to his senses, looking first at his mistress with intelligent, equally bewildered eyes, and then at the lingering men, and he let out a low growl. He could not yet stand, but they feared what would happen if he did. It was only by the weight of the woman’s hand on his shoulder that held him still, kept him from mauling the both of them. His claws scraped at the ground, his lips raised to reveal enormous fangs, but he still remained at his mistress’s side.

The men looked from the lion to the woman, holding her gaze so that their cowardice was less apparent, and what they saw there was something neither of them would forget. Her black eyes spoke of boundless sorrow, transcending time longer than they could comprehend. Her sorrow was palpable, just like her fury.

Neither the woman nor the lion moved from this spot, even as the men backed away, climbed into their wagon, and trundled off to retrieve the rest of their kills. Neither looked as they returned, giving the pair a wide berth, and moved off to smoother terrain, toward the nearest village. The woman sat, hand rested against the lion’s head, back straight, pink curls flying the stiff desert breeze. The lion lay subdued, disoriented, and very much animated; “alive” was debatable.

They never saw them, the woman or the lion, again. There are stories, however, that began to spring up soon after and continued for generations afterwards, stories of a beast who acted as guardian of the desert. Pink-furred and glowing eyes, he was known to attack anyone with ill intentions, keeping them away.

Sometimes, the beast was alone. Sometimes he was accompanied by the fabled pink-haired, sad-eyed angel, mourning the loss of her slaughtered pride.

**Author's Note:**

> This is probably the heaviest thing I've ever written (and shared), so here you go! I really tried to take it easy with the graphic details because I know it would bother me if it wasn't my own fic; gore of any kind really messes with my head. I think I should write a follow-up thing with how Rose feels about what just happened--she did discover a new ability, after all--but I'm not sure I'm that invested in it. Anyways, thanks for reading!


End file.
